| I cannot rightly say "all," or even "most," | | | | society, rather than the conscious creation |
| but certainly many of the Wiccans I have | | | | of resolutions to those ills and a brighter |
| known or observed over the years appear to | | | | future for everybody.But I understand those |
| find in Wicca a unique brand of escapism from | | | | nostalgic feelings, I really do. Society, at |
| the travails of our modern world, a safe | | | | this present moment in history, is |
| haven from the uniquely complex moral, | | | | frighteningly unbalanced in favor of |
| environmental, social and political issues | | | | violence, fascism, corporate hegemony, |
| that define our era. They appear to seek to | | | | misogyny, the Industrial rape and pillage of |
| turn back the clock, to retreat into a pagan | | | | the Earth and its parallel attack on the |
| agrarian culture that no longer exists, or to | | | | human spirit in the form of rampant |
| "resurrect" a Medieval, | | | | consumerism, etc. We are clearly headed at |
| "thatched-cottage-on-the-edge-of-the-woods" | | | | break-neck speed toward almost certain |
| society that is far more a product of | | | | disaster. Faced with our present real world |
| Renaissance festivals and paperback fantasy | | | | situation, who wouldn't "Look homeward with |
| novels than of anything to be found in real, | | | | longing?"There's an episode of the old 1960s |
| recorded history. This nostalgic (from the | | | | Star Trek television series in which Kirk and |
| Greek nostos algos, or literally, "To look | | | | company beam down to help evacuate a planet |
| homeward with longing") brand of Wicca | | | | whose sun is about to go supernova. But when |
| generally embodies an abdication of | | | | the "away team" reaches the planet's surface, |
| responsibility for the ills of modern | | | | they find nobody home. |